About

RickB- Human, Artist, Fool.

Ynys Mon, UK.

The blog is called ten percent because of what Kurt Vonnegut wrote when remembering Susan Sontag - She was asked what she had learned from the Holocaust, and she said that 10 percent of any population is cruel, no matter what, and that 10 percent is merciful, no matter what, and that the remaining 80 percent could be moved in either direction.-

And I'm writing it because I need the therapy and I lust for world domination.

Construction Industry’s McCarthy Gets Off With Small Fine

Some of Britain’s leading construction firms subscribed to a secret blacklist of workers which prevented them from getting jobs, a court has heard. More than 40 firms used the database of 3,213 workers – which included details of trade union activity – to vet workers, Knutsford Crown Court heard. Ian Kerr, 66, of Avoncroft Road, Stoke Heath, Worcestershire, has been fined £5,000 for administering the list.

Keer has form as a latter day McCarthy-

Kerr has spent many years compiling databases on workers. He did not wish to comment on a report in the Guardian 15 years ago which said he had been working for the Economic League, a controversial vetting agency which accumulated files on thousands of people it considered subversive between 1919 and 1993.

I said at the time- Will the numerous companies listed… who used his expensive blacklist services be prosecuted?- I am trying to act surprised that not only have none of them have been prosecuted but the single man brought to trial gets a small fine.

Kerr ran the blacklist for up to 15 years. The court heard that accounts showed it was paid £478,000 between 2004 and March 2009.

Still investigations are ongoing, as they say (will the police be helping the ICO?)…

After the hearing, ICO investigator Dave Clancy said the inquiry would continue to see if the companies involved had broken the law. “We are looking to see if the requirements of the Data Protection Act have been complied with. We will take action in due course,” said Mr Clancy.

George Guy, regional secretary for the construction workers’ union Ucatt, said he was disappointed by the result of the hearing. He said: “The people who provided this information and received it have got off scot free. Some of our members were out of work for years because of this list. They were forced to live in poverty, unable to provide for their families and they had no idea why. We will continue this fight until the companies involved are brought before the courts.”

He’s been at it for decades, so why did he get done now? Protection not so willingly provided? He’s 66, probably retiring anyway, so this gets done with while the new higher tech blacklist operates away from the glare of publicity perchance?